HumbleTrader 

Thanks . Much appreciated. Hopefully I don't have to do this for too long and expect my CQG to be up and running by the end of the week. BTW, AMP did approve my application as there were some regulatory changes in Canada and they accept our applications now.

That's great to hear! I am surprised that MJNK is not more heavily traded by 9-5ers in north America. Same for HSI. Best of luck with it!

josh 

That's great to hear! I am surprised that MJNK is not more heavily traded by 9-5ers in north America. Same for HSI. Best of luck with it!

Gonna jump in on the convo. I am feeling good about trading MES, and maybe ES soon, because I am very familiar with the action and "feel". I have a good gut sense when things are 'right' with the big pic or not. Curious if you would consider the Nikkei or HSI as completely different beasts compared to ES/NQ or is the general PA reasonably similar? HumbleT has stated he trades 'before lunch' ...ie the Open and then some. I assume because that's the active time. I've always kinda thought of the Asian markets kinda like trading ES overnight...random, sketchy action.

Maybe it's time I just pull up a chart and watch for a bit.

Blue Eagle 

Gonna jump in on the convo. I am feeling good about trading MES, and maybe ES soon, because I am very familiar with the action and "feel". I have a good gut sense when things are 'right' with the big pic or not. Curious if you would consider the Nikkei or HSI as completely different beasts compared to ES/NQ or is the general PA reasonably similar? HumbleT has stated he trades 'before lunch' ...ie the Open and then some. I assume because that's the active time. I've always kinda thought of the Asian markets kinda like trading ES overnight...random, sketchy action. Maybe it's time I just pull up a chart and watch for a bit.

Nikkei is kind of like ES, with the propensity to sometimes be a bit more wild, but can also have periods where it is very slow. On tradingview look at symbol NK225M1! (continuous Mini Nikkei). You will see it has been range bound for quite a while, but sometimes the intraday action is good. It's a thick book like ES. Sanity check, never trade the CME Nikkei contract. Only the MJNK contract on the Osaka exchange.

HSI is much more like NQ. Would recommend MHI (1/5 size of HSI). It can be wild and will rip your face off like NQ can.

I would treat each of them as completely independent of anything you know, until you have traded them on paper for a while. Nikkei is safer but like ES can be deceptively good at spoiling your day. Remember, each market has its own set of economic events to be aware of. You don't want to be randomly trading the Nikkei on the night of a BoJ meeting at 10:30pm ET. And China is a whole other story.

There's nothing particularly sketchy about them, any more than SPX is sketchy because it's trading while Japanese traders are asleep. They just have to be respected. I would not randomly trade Nat Gas, for example, because it has its own set of peculiarities. So it goes for all markets.

Thanks for sharing your experience with the asian markets and for chiming in.

I certainly agree that each market has its own personality. However, since Market is collection of individuals and the primary drivers are fear and greed, price action has more similarities than differences. We certainly need to observe first, then dip and finally dive.

The above example of NQ vs ES by Josh is a good one. Since I am more visual, I wanted to 'see' the difference and this is what I found with just 2 simple inputs.

1. When we are in a bull market and price closes higher EOD, ES is generally a safer bet and more predictable to go long @ the following RTH open.

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2. However, when there is a correction and price dips below 20 DMA, NQ truly becomes 'alive' and smashes ES out of the park.


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A big advantage of Nikkei mini, for me, is its tick value. It's 4 USD (approx) sits neatly between MES 1.25 and ES 12.5. I found the graduation of MES to ES a bit too intense, particularly with my style of building up position to max 4 contracts. Hopefully NK will help.

HumbleTrader 

1. When we are in a bull market and price closes higher EOD, ES is generally a safer bet and more predictable to go long @ the following RTH open. 2. However, when there is a correction and price dips below 20 DMA, NQ truly becomes 'alive' and smashes ES out of the park.

Interesting results. What is the horizontal axis in these charts?

twosigma 

Interesting results. What is the horizontal axis in these charts?

Horizontal axis is the timeline. Data starts from 2003. Over the last 20 years, we had around 450 days with these conditions to compare. More detailed info next to the graph now.


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June 20 2024

I have decided to trade MES instead of ES. I want to be fluent with scaling and size up first before taking the extra monetary risk with ES.

I'm comfortable with Nikkei mini. DAX mini is also ok in terms of price risk but the liquidity is poor. Hence, I have to think about it. Europeans love their CFDs but I believe north american regulations prohibit that.

Back to ES. I'm long @ 62 and then scaled in again @ 64. The premise of this trade is that market tends to close bullish on the day before OPEX when we are at 52 weeks high. I wanted to add more but currently the retest is deeper than I expected. Hence, I will wait for more strength before adding. Target is ONH @ 88. If we go below 59, I'm likely wrong.

I have 0 issues getting fills on the DAX. Give it a go.

Unpretty Nikkei start

After setting up new trading account with AMP and my new data with CQG/Sierra, I traded Nikkei mini today.

My premise was a reasonable one. NK opened gap down and I had a bearish bias. However, I expected a gap fill and hence faded it @ Y-C by shorting the bounce. Subsequent price movement was a bit unexpected and it felt like a rodeo. MAE and MFE 100 pts.

I struggled to read the price action as my CQG data was behaving oddly with some unexpected volume bars. It's my Sierra setting, I think. Anyways, instead of going flat, I decided to double down. When price made a new higher high, I realized that my premise was wrong. Got out 1/2 and let the other 1/2 close by the end of the day.

I wanted to share this trade to highlight 1 positive change I made this year. Not adding to my loser. I made some comments thread regarding the same. I'm also fighting my inner demon of letting a losing day-trade to a swing trade. Another manifestation of avoiding pain of a losing trade but I resisted today.

I know my winners look awesome with my new found confidence in scaling now. I still need to work hard on making even my losers pretty.
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Pretty loss

I didn't have to wait for too long to create a pretty loss.

I executed my bearish bias really well. i.e Quite aggressive but as per my plan. Reached my max size as I saw more weakness without adding to a loser.

I was targeting 20 DMA below 650 and anticipating more. Price seemed to agree with me (though volume was hesitant) but then buyers stepped in and a V reversal happened. Usually I freeze up, like a deer caught in headlights. Not this time. I exited gracefully and accepted a small loss.

Yes, I gave up paper profit but the pain was minimal as my plan was to grab at least 3 times of that amount. Though I can grab small profits to boost my ego & cushion my P&L (I might do soon), I want to get comfortable with losing paper profits first.

Pain of loss and the pain of losing paper profits are the 2 major obstacles for retail traders and my goal is to overcome those first. I'm getting there but it's painfully slow